I came across this fascinating web site showcasing gardens built on vertical surfaces. It struck me as showing a desire to cover up the built environment; so turn parts of our concrete and glass environment into something more 'natural'. However, going to such lengths (even though it is relatively low tech, apart from automated watering and feeding systems) says more about our need to control than our love and appreciation of nature, to my mind at any rate.

A seagull in Scotland has developed the habit of stealing chips from a neighborhood shop.

Yay, there are times when it seems things start to fit into place. Discovering digital artists working and living in and with the materiality of natural places is so refreshing. Specially, when some of them are your school friends.

Wray Village on Youtube may make David and i jealous of Keith and Mark (respected, HCI people at Lancaster, who helped in setting up and studying the Wifi) but only because it makes such an important contribution to ideas about community, rural places and natural disasters ....

From: xxx.xxxxx@jcu.edu.au
Subject: URGENT NOTICE: Total campus computer and communications outage required NOW!
Date: 21 September 2007 1:20:46 PM
To: xxxxxxxxxxxxxx@jcu.edu.au

To: The JCU Community

Sharing my beach with my friends brings us mutual moments of belonging within an ever changing world; some functionality on social networking technologies can offer similar experiences.

and i am back!! it has been a long time between posts so here is a lovely bizarre one for you: the avatar machine :

I came across this set of sunset piccies on flickr and even though they're somewhat schmaltzy they evoked a real visceral response in me. Some of them might not even be 'sunset' photos - they might just be photoshopped to have sunsettish colours. I think I was surprised - I'm sure my heart-rate went up and there would have been a measurable change in my galvanic skin response - but how do you measure the lump in my throat?

In Mali i saw a wonderful example of how playful and social pursuits become etched into the land.

I very much enjoy making panoramas and simple ones are very easy to make. It seems a number of people find them fascinating - it's much more than a typical picture of a view. I'm not at all certain why they are fascinating. Is it because often they're displayed a bit at a time - a sort of revealing? Is it because they put a view of a landscape in a larger context? Is it because you can 'see' a wider angle than you would normally - if you didn't turn your head? Does it mimic turning your head in some way?